The stubborn structure: Essays on criticism and society

by Northrop Frye, Max Black (Editor)

This wonderful The Stubborn Essays on Criticism and society by Northrop Frye is a joy. This volume is made up of some of his most important recent essays, and contain some of his central ideas and most pointed prose.

Genres: Criticism

316 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1970

About the author

Born in Quebec but raised in New Brunswick, Frye studied at the University of Toronto and Victoria University. He was ordained to the ministry of the United Church of Canada and studied at Oxford before returning to UofT.

His first book, Fearful Symmetry, was published in 1947 to international acclaim. Until then, the prophetic poetry of William Blake had long been poorly understood, considered by some to be delusional ramblings. Frye found in it a system of metaphor derived from Paradise Lost and the Bible. His study of Blake's poetry was a major contribution. Moreover, Frye outlined an innovative manner of studying literature that was to deeply influence the study of literature in general. He was a major influence on, among others, Harold Bloom and Margaret Atwood.

In 1974-1975 Frye was the Norton professor at Harvard University.

Frye married Helen Kemp, an educator, editor and artist, in 1937. She died in Australia while accompanying Frye on a lecture tour. Two years after her death in 1986 he married Elizabeth Brown. He died in 1991 and was interred in Mount Pleasant Cemetery in Toronto, Ontario. The Northrop Frye Centre at Victoria College at the University of Toronto was named in his honour.

See also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northrop...

Reviews

[Grant Rincon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Essays I loved: "The Knowledge of Good and Evil," "Speculation and Concern," "On Value-Judgements," "Criticism, Visible and Invisible," "Elementary Teaching and Elemental Scholarship," "Varieties of Literary Utopias," "The Road of Excess," "The Keys to the Gates," "The Drunken Boat," "The Problem of Spiritual Authority in the Nineteenth Century.

I did not read the essays on Dickens and Yeats. Since I have only read Great Expectations by Dickens and nothing by Yeats, they did not seem like essays that would be particularly fruitful for me to read right now.

[Mark · Rating 4 out of 5]

A collection in which some essays seem perfunctory, but the writings about pedagogy and the straight criticism added an extra starry star to my rating. Contains an especially interesting essay about utopian writings from Plato to 20th century Soviets and Brits.